1. I use Avast and Malwarebytes

My son's laptop was having all sorts of mysterious problems a few months ago. His Norton antivirus was up to date, and said that everything was fine. Just for fun, I tried Malwarebytes. It found some trojans, cleaned 'em, and all was well. Norton is now gone.

9. yep

2. I use ESET and Spybot Search & Destroy

I don't know how well ESET is rated, but I like it better than Symantec, which I had before.

Spybot is freeware (Although they accept donations) and it's been pretty awesome. I have a second computer that I don't take online much which runs Microsoft Security Essentials. I ran a scan last week- Spybot turned up a whole gaggle of stuff after MSE said the system was clean. (although, to be fair, Spybot searches for different things than active virus protections like ESET and MSE)

4. What do you use for a firewall?

And is it set up properly? That could be your problem, too.

Anyway, on my computers, I use Malwarebytes, SUPERAntiSpyware, MS Security Essentials. Except for cookies, they very seldom find anything. However on other people's computers that I maintain, they do find malware fairly often.

5. My experience with System Mechanic was not happy.

It missed some really nasty malware, and when expiration date approached, it bogged my system down to near-death state. It also didn't live up to expectations as a system maintenance tool, and ultimately corrupted my registry. I dumped it for AVG, and have never been sorry. For the money, System Mechanic was a lemon, IMHO.

6. I use McAfee,

SuperAntiSpyware and Malwarebytes.

I buy my McAfee through buy.com where it's a lot cheaper.

This is the result I get from ShieldsUp when it probes my computer:

Your system has achieved a perfect "TruStealth" rating. Not a single packet — solicited or otherwise — was received from your system as a result of our security probing tests. Your system ignored and refused to reply to repeated Pings (ICMP Echo Requests). From the standpoint of the passing probes of any hacker, this machine does not exist on the Internet. Some questionable personal security systems expose their users by attempting to "counter-probe the prober", thus revealing themselves. But your system wisely remained silent in every way. Very nice.

I was alerted to the first site after reading the following article titled "Microsoft Security Essentials Fails Certification Again." This really surprised me. MSE has always trailed the better A/V products at detecting viruses by a small bit at the AV-Comparatives link but it was still had a fairly decent detection rate.

Whatever you do, don't run two antivirus programs at the same time. Doing so can cause the two programs to "fight" with each other and provoke false positives, slow down your computer or even hang your system. Only have one A/V product installed at a time.

8. MSE (Microsoft) is a "set it & forget it" AV that does one thing

give real-time Anti-Virus protection which is all I want in an AV. Two things, actually--It also adds "Microsoft Network Inspection Service". It is light on system resources and is easily configured. I use it on both my machines as well as a few Virtual machines.

I am a former long time Avast user which is "good" also...it just became too "busy" IMHO, YMMV.

I agree with Manny...a layered approach is always a good idea...MBAM in my experience plays "nice" with MSE (also Avast which I used before) not so much with McAfee & Norton from what I've read. An MBAM (PRO) lifetime license is money well spent @ $24.95, less if you look for sales/coupons. There are many good suggestions in the replies above.

I too saw & was surprised by the comparison davepdx referred to--I will continue to use MSE until it bites me in the a**

11. the standard installation for windows os at my job (computer tech) is

avast OR stop sign (not both), advanced system care, and spybot. sometimes malwarebytes but it gets annoying. so does avast after a while but set settings > sounds to off and advanced > sandbox to off and the experience isn't too bad with the free version.

for external virus removal i use 'clamav' a free open-source linux-based antivirus program. just pop a live cd in or pull the hard drive and plug it into a linux box and voila' rootkit virus no more.

12. oh yeah - norton and mcafee are of the devil

they slow your machine down and sometimes just plain fuck it up. uninstall them today and cleanse, rinse, cleanse, rinse and reinstall a lightweight free antivirus app like avast or pay for something better like stop sign (but not norton or mcafee!)

15. Thanks so much for your advice!!!

I have 5 computers in 3 homes, mine and relatives' who will also thank you for this if it works. But I doubt it will.

I'm afraid Avast! puts a little cookie on machines now, and detects if you have used over a year of free virus scans, and won't let you download the free version on that computer for another year again.

23. similar boat here

I've got 5 of them, the oldest is a ThinkPad made in 1998 with a 6 gb hard drive! You cannot run an anti-virus on it easily but I'm able to run Avira on it. You might give it a try. I have it on all of these computers and I've never been asked for any money.

24. Thank you, I will investigate and try Avira on mine first.

See what it does.

My two relatives with their 3 computers between them, they know nothing of what I do to make their computers safe, and they both click to open AOL spam mail that says stuff like, "your secret sexy pictures are available here.."

I'd say this sums it up esp. the part about the amount of RAM required to run it. for that reason alone w/me (I'd be using no anti-virus on the old ThinkPad as I cannot find one that uses this small amount of RAM that will actually install and run).

16. i am looking at avira av now as an alternative to avast

when i install avast for people then in no time it will start nagging them for money now. so i started looking for open source solutions too. i need to look at both avg and avira from a noob point of view and see what the experience is like. i am also going to try in combo with Immunet which can run alongside other av and is based on clamav open source http://www.clamav.net/lang/en/about/win32/.

ideally i want to find antivirus software that is completely free and works well to install on customer computers.

19. Thanks everyone

Now I have to some research I guess, just not happy with System Mechanic. We were running Avast and the Dell tech told me it wasn't good enough.

I also spoke with a young computer tech up here and he said all he uses is Winows security essentials.

I was told not to use Malware Bytes because I could remove something that I shouldn't Do have CC cleaner on the computer and have used that.

Now we are having the nightmare of installing a printer with wireless capabilities. The HP we had finally went back to the store after a wk of HP tech support and no solutioons. Got a cannon this time, not fun.

25. Here's a radical idea: how about having computer manufacturers ...

give you a FREE FOR FIVE YEARS, anti virus software?

Then, if you still use your same computer after 5 years, they can sell you something for years 6-10 for $20 a computer. After that, you are on your own, but who has a computer they bought for less than $1500 be used for more than 10 years? If you paid more than $15oo, (like a few Apples), then you get free lifetime virus protection software until the thing becomes a doorstop. By the way, I have a 1999 MAC computer, it still runs, but I don't use it more than twice a year to store my pictures as a backup drive.